Among cochlear implant systems, the most commonly used device is a monaural cochlear implant configured to electrically stimulate an auditory nerve of a cochlea at one ear in order to generate hearing perception. As an alternative to the monaural cochlear implant, it is possible to use a binaural implant configured to provide the patient with a pseudo stereophony through simultaneous stimulation of cochleae at both ear using an ipsilateral electrode and a contralateral electrode.
As a binaural implant requires implanting two electrode arrays, a more complicated surgery is required than for implanting a classic monaural cochlear implant. During the surgery, the electrical wires to be placed into the lead during the tunneling of the electrode array can easily be damaged.
During the binaural implantation, there is a risk of rupturing electrical wires when the contralateral electrode array is pulled into the tunnel. There is also a risk of damaging the electrode array itself. In the prior art, a long silicone tubing covers and protects the electrode array and is maintained by friction silicone on silicone, but sometimes this tubing sticks on the lead and is difficult to remove.
It is desirable to be able to provide a binaural cochlear implant system that reduces or even eliminates the risk of damage on the electrical wires of the lead, during the tunneling of the electrode array so that the electrodes can be protected during the surgery.
It would also be desirable to provide a binaural cochlear implant system that requires a smaller size of tunnelling in order to reduce the time of healing of subjacent tissues. It may be further desirable to allow for reducing the number of steps required to pass the array. The present disclosure provides at least an alternative to the prior art.